House Prices Steady as Volumes Recover

Housing auction volumes have bounced back from the lows of a long weekend packed with football grand finals, but sale numbers are still sharply down from a year ago.

But, with more buyers, prices have remained steady.

There were 2,246 home auctions in the week to Sunday, two and half times the previous week's 872, property market analytics firm CoreLogic says.

The previous week's volumes had been depressed by a long weekend in several states and the NRL and AFL grand finals.

The increase in sellers was met by a return of buyers, which lifted the auction clearance rate to 79.2 per cent, from the previous week's 75.8 per cent and the year-ago rate of 69.5 per cent.

But despite the rebound, auction volumes were still 26 per cent lower than the 3,016 recorded in the corresponding week of 2015, which contributed to a 15 per cent fall in in the number of completed sales.

Mainland capital city prices held steady for the week, on average.

There were gains of 0.1 per cent in Sydney and Brisbane, and 1.1 per cent in Perth. But they were offset by a 0.4 per cent fall in Melbourne and a 1.2 per cent decline in Adelaide.

Annual price growth, while still solid at 7.0 per cent, is down from the 10.9 per cent pace of this time last year.

Among the five capitals, Sydney is at the top of the annual price growth list at 10.2 per cent, but still slower than the year-ago pace of 16.9 per cent. Melbourne is next next at 8.7 per cent, from 12.9 per cent a year ago.

Brisbane's current pace of 3.9 per cent is down from 5.6 per cent at this point in 2015, while Adelaide's 4.1 per cent growth rate has picked up from 1.4 per cent.

Perth's annual decline of 5.6 per cent is steeper than the 2.3 per cent annual fall recorded a year ago as the mining investment slump continues to weigh on the local market.